The wages of sin

Book I.— Man And Maid

Things are what they are, and the consequences of them will be what they will be ; why then should we desire to be deceived.’ — Bishop Butler.

Chapter I.

One September day towards sunset, when the world was younger by some fourteen or fifteen years than it is now, a small family party was gathered together in the long, narrow strip of turf and flower-garden known as the bowling-green, that lies under the old wing of Slerracombe House.

The individuals composing this party were not, with one exception, very remarkable at first sight. A lady of about five-and-forty, seated in a low wicker chair, near a tea table placed on the gravel just outside the open doors of the conservatory. She was large, sleek, rather heavyfeatured. Arrayed in wig and robes, she would have made an impressive judge. Her presence would have added dignity, as well as material weight, to the bench. She was not, however, arrayed in official robes, but merely in mourning — mourning, it may be added, of the order which, among sober-minded persons of the upper classes, denotes widowhood in the passive and permanent rather than the active stage. At the table, two little girls — in brown holland frocks and straw hats of the kind known to contemporary fashion as 1 limpet-shaped/ and fondly believed to compensate by successful preservation of the complexion of the wearer, for the immediate disadvantage of extreme unbecomingness — were sitting silent, absorbed in the assimilation of liberal supplies of cake and grapes, and bread and jam. Further, a handsome, black-headed boy, also consuming cake, but taking his meal in an ambulatory and episodic manner, in the intervals of driving away a tame doe, with a bell round her neck, whose feminine in-

B

The Wages of Sin.

quisitiveness prompted her to ill-judged inquiries regarding the contents of teacups and sugar basins. Finally, a clergyman, Kent Crookenden by name, Rector of Brattleworthy with ‘"lerracombe, a bachelor of about fifty, brother-in-law of the lady in the wicker chair, and guardian of her only son, Lancelot — the boy already mentioned.

The Rector had refused to have any tea. He leaned back in another wicker chair, his legs crossed, his coat thrown open, and his thumbs stuck in the armholes of his waistcoat, surveying the scene before him with an expression of half-contemptuous though not unkindly amusement. Sometimes his eyes wandered from the group in the foreground to a wide stretch of open park, dotted with fallow deer, lying north and west below the terraced garden. The park dipped to the left towards a wooded stream in the hollow, and swept up again into breezy hillside, red and yellow with withering bracken. Beyond it the sea, crossed by wandering tide-lines of the palest azure, spread away calm and oily, under a sky of filmy white cloud, to the high faint line of the horizon.

The view was extremely pleasing in its dreamy quiet, specially to one with a taste for the characteristic features of West Country scenery. And Kent Crookenden was sincerely attached to the West Country. All the same he was not of the temper of mind that finds its highest and most constant satisfaction in the contemplation of the outward aspects of nature. Hill, wood, stream, moorland, sea, values of light and shade, splendours of colour are, no doubt, immensely elevating objects of attention in their way ; but they do not, as a rule, minister largely or directly to the spectator’s sense of humour. And Kent Crookenden’s sense of humour was almost undesirably keen and persistent. To this, his face — it had no hair on it — bore ample testimony. A square forehead. Bright, steady eyes, set rather far apart. A hooked nose, with a noticeable downward inclination of the tip, the nostrils deep cut and open. A mouth thin-lipped and under hung ; the corners of it also with a downward inclination, and with queer twitchings and puckerings about them suggestive of thoughts a trifle too merry or too caustic for ordinary conversation.

Man and Maid .

After some years of travels both in the East and the United States, at about thirty, Kent Crookenden had suddenly decided to enter the Church. In one respect the decision was, certainly, a wise one. Fora strong sense of humour necessarily demands a good supply of raw material, in the form of human nature, upon which to exercise itself ; and whatever the more serious privileges of the clerical profession may be, there is no question but that it offers to any man, with the wit to use them, singular facilities for intimate and varied study of the ways and habits, the weaknesses, the appetites, the endless touching little stupidities in thought and conduct of that most inimitable invention, the human animal.

In due time his elder brother, Zachary Crookenden, had presented him to the living of Brattleworthy with Sierracombe. For that gentleman had bought the advowson of the living when, his fortune having reached very considerable proportions, he married Miss Caroline Hellard — niece of the late and cousin of the present Lord Combmartin — retired from active participation in the affairs of the well-known firm of Crookenden, Manserge and Co., merchants, shipping agents, and bankers, of Bristol and New York ; and, having purchased Slerracombe House and some three or four thousand acres of land adjoining, settled himself down to live the leisurely life of an English country gentleman.

Kent Crookenden had ceased to entertain any dreams of ecstatic personal bliss by the time he took up his residence in the ugly, white-washed rectory house at Brattleworthy. And he was consequently very well satisfied with his surroundings. He amused himself greatly by observing the manners and customs of his merchant brother turned squire, of the local gentry, of his fellow-clergy, and of his parishioners. And being a member of the Anthropological Society, and a fair ethnologist and archaeologist, he brought a considerable amount of theoretical knowledge to bear upon the facts immediately presented to his notice. He had, indeed, a propos of certain quaint wedding customs obtaining in the neighbouring fishing village of Beera Mills, written a monograph on Primitive Marriage, which — whatever its scientific value — certainly afforded very

b 2

The Wages of Sin.

gay reading to persons whose mental digestion was not fatally weakened by over refinement.

Upon the still September afternoon in question, the human creature who had the honour of occupying a foremost place in the Rector’s attention, was the, as yet, unspecified member of the family party, viz., a slender slip of a girl, whose light movements and rather startling costume rendered her small presence of marked value in the otherwise low-toned picture.

She wore a straight, sacque-shaped frock of orange and scarlet checked cotton, and a broad scarlet sash knotted loosely about her waist. The frock was undeniably short, and revealed the embroidered edge of a white petticoat and a length of open- worked, black silk stocking. Her hat bore no relation to the estimable limpet. It was white, high-crowned, and adorned on one side with a flaring bow of scarlet ribbon. Yet the little lady’s complexion did not appear to have suffered to the extent to which, according to all nursery canons of poetical justice, it ought to have suffered from this reprehensible levity of headgear. Her small face was very pale.

Indeed, there were curiously contradictory elements in the little girl’s appearance. At a short distance the effect of her vivid figure was like that of some coquettish personage on the lid of a Parisian bonboniere. Yet the child’s face was not only pale, but full of reserve, of a questioning wistfulness, lighted by a pair of big, wondering, dark-blue eyes. And it was precisely this contradiction, this duality of suggestion, that her uncle, Kent Crookenden, found so interesting as he sat watching her. Mary was twelve years old. Usually an awkward age, as the Rector reflected. It was difficult to say as yet — for she was like a half-fledged bird, all eyes and neck and legs — whether she would grow up commonplace-looking, or develop into an unusually beautiful woman, like

Mr. Crookenden did not finish the sentence even in thought. He agreed with himself to change the subject immediately. It was a subject, in fact, which for many years he had found a very frequent necessity for changing. But, though his efforts would at first appear successful, he observed that his mental conversation had a tiresome habit of working back into the same groove again before many days, or indeed hours, were over.

On the present occasion he routed the unprofitable subject completely, as he fondly imagined, by turning and addressing his sister-in-law.

1 By the way, Caroline/ he remarked, * if Coad says anything to you about a party of young people from Beera picnicing down at Red Rock, remember I gave them leave to go there. They asked permission very civilly, and I saw no objection to granting it/

‘Yes, I suppose it wouldn't do to refuse people now. If you have finished your tea, Adela, you and Carrie may go ' — this over her ample shoulder to the silent little girls in brown holland. ‘ Of course I never pretended to care about the park being thrown open; but poor Mr. Crookenden made a point of it/

‘ Quite right too/ said the Rector.

‘And I suppose these people are not likely to do any serious damage.'

‘ Damage ? What possible damage can they or any one else do to a mile of rabbit warren, two or three acres of perpendicular slate and granite, and the Atlantic ? ’

‘ Oh, well/ Mrs. Crookenden rejoined, in her calm, well-bred way, ‘ they leave bottles about, and paper-bags, which is not at all nice. And then the children are very fond of taking their tea down to Red Rock, and I am always rather afraid of infection. With people out of those stuffy little cottages at Beera, one never can be quite sure, you know. Have you said your grace, Carrie ? ’

This again over her shoulder, with a slow smile at the two girls as they left the table. Then she settled herself back in her chair and applied her fingers to the further development of a nebulous garment in crochet.

The Rector made no reply to his sister-in-law's observations, but his mouth twitched slightly and turned down at one corner.

He held that there was a very healthy reserve force of egotism in Mrs. Crookenden. Her egotism was not of the baser sort, he admitted. It was a comprehensive, tribal kind of egotism, including several persons besides her.

The Wages of Sin.

self. Whether it had ever entirely included her late husband, his brother Zachary, the Rector had never yet been able to determine. Still, in the main, he liked his sister-in-law. She was a distinguished-looking woman ; and, save when you trod on the toes of some small prejudice, a very fairly agreeable one. She was also very fairly amenable to reason, which, considering the relation in which he stood both to her son and the Slerracombe property, was a matter of sincere thanksgiving to the Rector. Moreover, she kept a first-rate cook. I regret to admit this item carried considerable weight in Kent Crookenden’s mind.

In the world at large Mrs. Crookenden had the reputation of being a very admirable person. She was of a placid disposition. The whole business of her courtship and marriage had been pre-eminently distinguished for its placidity. As the younger daughter of a younger son — by no means oppressed with a superfluity of worldly goods — she, being a right-minded young lady, had immediately realised the desirability of an alliance with the rich, middle-aged merchant-banker. She accepted him calmly, and without hesitation, when he proposed to her. He had been married before. But his first wife— I speak from the point of view of the poor lady’s successor — had had the good taste to die childless. The second Mrs. Crookenden proceeded to fulfil all her marital obligations, the production of a son and heir included, with well-bred composure. And when Mr. Crookenden, after a few years’ residence at Slerracombe — finding, somehow, the leisurely life of a country gentleman far harder work than that of the Bristol counting-house — left this world, in which he had laid up such a handsome amount of material treasure, for that other, in which all such treasure is reported to be inconveniently devoid of market value, his wife manifested no objection to surviving him.

In fact, she survived him with what appeared to some persons — among them William Crookenden, now head of the firm, and father of little Mary— an uncalled-for amount of her habitual placidity. The Dowager Lady Combmartin and the Hellard side of the connection, however, took a different view of her conduct. And, being who they

Man and Maid.

were, surely their view must have been the correct one ? They declared that — * dearest Carrie, as usual, was behaving quite beautifully. And they did hope, poor darling, after all she had gone through, that she would be rewarded/ It was by way of contributing to this end, I suppose, that they all elected to come down in little batches of twos and threes and stay at Slerracombe shortly after the funeral. The Hellards are a numerous clan as everybody knows. They hold together. They have a great power of standing back to back. Their Irish estate pays very badly. They are not rich, but they are acquisitive. They make excellent use of their opportunities. A great many of them were a great deal at Slerracombe during that spring and summer; and the weather, I remember, was particularly lovely.

Kent Crookenden derived much edification from the observation of these things. Old Lady Combmartin was most gracious to him, pronouncing him very superior to the rest of his family. Lady Dorothy Hellard, a sprightly spinster whose age it would be uncourteous to state in plain figures, also looked kindly upon him. Said, more than once, how thankful she should be if she could only manage to be more with dearest Carrie in future. Often spoke of her longing for a quiet country life. And remarked casually one day that, with a little building, the Rectory would not really be such a very bad house. The Rector, however, did not see it ; which means that he saw quite clearly enough to see through it, and the notion of running in couples with Lady Dorothy failed to attract him. Possibly the unprofitable subject which he so constantly tried and, alas ! failed to expunge from his thoughts had something to do with this disinclination. For a man may be a good ethnologist and member of any number of learned societies, and yet have a weak unscientific side to him, where sentiment obtains to the lamentable discomfiture of common-sense and pure reason.

But Mrs. Crookenden, being ignorant of the existence of the unprofitable subject, and having had many confidential conversations with old Lady Combmartin, still entertained a hope that the Rector might not remain everlastingly obdurate. Now, as she sat in large, judicial

The Wages of Sin.

silence developing her woollen crochet garment, her mind was busy, as it had so often been busy before, with devices for bringing round the conversation to marriage in general, and the Lady Dorothy’s marriage in particular. Unfortunately, the Rector was somewhat unapproachable when it came to personal matters. And how to offer her cousin to him as permanent lady companion, delicately, diplomatically, yet clearly and unmistakably, Mrs. Crookenden really did not quite see.

Meanwhile Mary, who had been flitting about at the further end of the long strip of turf, suddenly bore down upon her uncle. The girl and the tame doe arrived together with a rush which caused Mrs. Crookenden to look up from her crochet with an air of cool, remonstrant wonder. She possessed the convenient gift of expressing annoyance and displeasure without resorting to the coarse and more or less compromising medium of speech.

‘ Please, Uncle Kent, may I go down into the park with Lance ? ’ the girl asked. ‘ You needn’t go home just yet, need you ? Lance has been to look at the hall clock. He says it’s ever so early. 1

Kent Crookenden, though not greatly addicted to caresses, put his arm round the slim, brilliant, little figure, and drew it close to him.

‘ What do you want to go down into the park again for, Miss Polly ? ’ he asked.

‘Why, to draw the deer. They’re standing nice and quiet now. And Lance says we can get quite near them.’

It was observable that Mary’s voice was singularly low and grave in quality, for a girl of her age.

Kent Crookenden smiled at her, at once tenderly and mockingly, and gently pinched her ear.

‘ Draw, draw, draw, from morning to night ; why, this devotion to the fine arts is astounding, Miss Polly. Do you know, Caroline,’ he went on, turning to his sister-in-law, ‘ this young lady promises to introduce a quite new element into the family history.’

‘ I think she has introduced it already/ Mrs. Crookenden remarked.

‘Yes, perhaps she has/ the Rector said, drily. ‘New elements are wholesome. But I was referring specially

Man and Maid.

to the artistic element, which has not, so far, been cultivated very successfully among us Crookendens. For we can hardly call poor, dear Sara Jacobini, with that impecunious, operatic Hebrew husband of hers, a success, I suppose. By the way, have you happened to hear anything of the poor woman lately, Caroline ? ’

I Nothing at all/ replied Mrs. Crookenden, a positive richness of negative in her tone.

( Oh ! I beg your pardon. I forgot second cousins don’t count on my side of the family. All the same, I own I have a weakness for Sara Jacobini. She has stuck by her operatic Hebrew very gallantly, through good report and evil report. I must remember to write to her again. I ought to have written sooner. Well, and so you want to go and draw the deer, Polly ; and I want to go home to my books and my dinner. Whose wants are the most imperative, do you think, yours or mine ? ’

The little girl nestled up against him prettily, coaxingly . — * Mine, I guess/ she said.

Mrs. Crookenden moved slightly, causing her silk dress to rustle and her wicker chair to creak.

* Very well then, I suppose I must endure the pangs of intellectual and physical hunger and give you half-anhour longer, young lady. But where is the famous drawing book ? Let me look at the labours of the day as far as they have gone yet.'

4 I ’low ' began Mary, brightly.

Mrs. Crookenden glanced up from her crochet again, with that same air of cool remonstrant wonder, as though the speaker came perilously near being guilty of contempt of court.

I I ’low I’d just as soon you didn’t see it, Uncle Kent. You never know what my drawings are meant for ; anyway, you make believe you don’t. Lance always knows, now/

1 Oh ! Lancelot always knows, does he ? Lancelot is a monstrously clever fellow/ said the Rector, pinching her ear again.

The boy was standing in front of his uncle, while the tame doe poked her square pinkish-brown muzzle under his arm in the vain effort to get at the leaves on the twig

The Wages of Sin .

of lime he held just beyond her reach. The doe was strong. She pushed and pressed with her hard muscular shoulders. But the boy was stronger still. He stood his ground. He was not thinking about the doe and her desire for lime leaves, but about his little cousin, and her desire to go down with him into the park again. Lancelot entertained much respectful admiration for his little cousin. He liked to be with her, though she did snub him a good deal at times. Polly was a new experience. He had never seen anybody like her. So he took the snubbing as part of the general novelty and bore it very good-temperedly.

He was a fine-looking lad, with the square-made figure, short, straight nose, well-shaped mouth — the lips full, yet firm and sweet — crisp hair sitting close to the head, smooth, oval, unshadowed face, and air of serene content which often go with remarkable bodily strength. His check tweed jacket was adorned by a multiplicity of pockets, and had a flap of brown leather let in on either shoulder. He wore very knowing breeches and gaiters. Lancelot hated new clothes. These were sufficiently worn to afford him that most perfect form of satisfaction which consists in indifference. To know they are so all right that you need not think about them is the acme of happiness in respect of clothes. Across his back he carried a pretty little rifle, slung by a strap.

Kent Crookenden looked from the pale-faced girl leaning against him to this very sportsmanlike young gentleman, and back again. His heavy under-jaw protruded, and his mouth worked into a twitching, caustic smile. Yet his eyes remained wholly kindly.

1 Lancelot seems to be making all the running just now, eh, Polly ? *

* He’s going back to school the day after to-morrow,’ she put in, apologetically.

The Rector’s smile broadened.

' Oh ! I’m not jealous, you conceited little puss. There, go along and draw the deer, or anything else you like in heaven or earth. Take care of her, Lancelot.’

'All right,’ the boy said-. He stuffed the lime leaves, twig and all, in between the doe’s nibbling lips. * Come

Man and Maid .

II along, Polly. Pm awfully glad you may stay. We’ll go anywhere you like.’

Then, as the boy and girl went away, side by side, across the terrace garden, the doe, with her tinkling bell, trotting mincingly in front, the Rector rose from his chair and walked slowly to the far end of the bowling-green.

Several little matters had combined to displease Mrs. Crookenden. The black enamel lockets, set with diamonds, depending from her gold bracelets, rattled ominously as she slipped the ivory crochet needle in and out of the white wool. Only the interests of poor Lady Dorothy had kept her silent. With the exception of Kent Mrs. Crookenden increasingly failed to see the point of her late husband’s family. Kent had been passed, so to speak, by the Hellards. That made a great difference. But now Kent himself elected to be annoying ; for, on coming back, his first observation was —

{ Those two young things make rather a pretty pair ; eh, Caroline ? ’

The lockets rattled. The ivory needle went steadily in and out, in and out of the white wool. Mrs. Crooken^jn was never in a hurry.

1 I have always strongly disapproved of first cousins marrying,’ she said, as though delivering sentence.

The Rector sat down in his wicker chair again.

‘ My dear Caroline, you positively take one’s breath away by your agility in jumping to conclusions. You leap to the ultimate possibility of a situation when the first word of the situation has barely been spoken.’

He leaned back, opened his coat, and stuck his thumbs in the armholes of his waistcoat again.

* But I verily believe you women begin worrying about who your babies shall, and still more shall not, marry before the poor innocents are out of long clothes. It is the same with all of you. Your outlook is saturated with matrimony. In the present case, however, notwithstanding the acknowledged precocity of the rising generation, . I don’t think you need have much anxiety yet awhile. Still — since you have suggested the idea, Caroline — I may say that Lancelot might do worse, in my humble opinion,

The Wages of Sin .

than set his affections on that young lady. If he does not, a good many others will, I fancy, in the course of the next ten years. I suspect she is going to grow into an uncommonly pretty little person. And the Hellard and Coudert strains are strong enough and far enough apart effectually to neutralise any evil results of cousinship on the Crookenden side, I should imagine.’

Mrs. Crookenden looked up. Her countenance presented an expanse of calm but solid displeasure.

‘ Really this discussion seems to me rather premature,’ she said. ‘ They are mere children. And there are plenty of other people for Lancelot to marry besides your brother William’s daughter.’

‘ Oh 1 dear yes, the world is wide,’ rejoined the Rector, with his twitching smile. ‘And Lancelot promises to be a handsome fellow, possessed of a handsome fortune moreover — a magnet with double power of attraction both to maidens and their mothers. He will probably have opportunities of playing pitch and toss to a large extent with the female heart if he chooses to avail himself of them. But I fancy he won't do that. He is a steady, persistent, dependable kind of being ; whereas poor little Mary will change her mind, or not know it — which comes to much the same in the end — a good many times before she settles down. Her southern blood will always make it only too possible she should be out of harmony with her English surroundings.’

‘ Her dress is sufficiently out of harmony with them already,’ Mrs. Crookenden remarked. ‘ And her accent is very peculiar. I have warned Carrie and Adela about it. I should be very sorry if they caught it. She uses most extraordinary expressions, too. Really, I think your brother William makes a dreadful mistake in leaving her so much with that negro nurse.’

‘ Mulatress,' interrupted the Rector.

But Mrs. Crookenden was not to be interrupted. She was placid, she was judicial, but she clearly had put on the black cap in respect of little Mary Crookenden’s upbringing.

‘ I don’t pretend to know what the degree of colour ma}' be,’ she continued. ‘To me she is simply a negro

Man and Maid.

woman — a woman who has been a slave, too. It is the most extraordinary arrangement. After his poor wife’s death ■’

* Ah/ said the Rector, very softly.

1 It would obviously have been very much wiser if your brother William had dismissed her and engaged a proper English maid. It would have been much better, of course, to let that curious American element die out altogether.

Kent Crookenden crossed his legs, and patted one foot up and down reflectively on the gravel.

1 Oh ! no doubt there is much to be said for making a clean sweep after a funeral/ he remarked. 1 Relics are a mistake. They sadly mitigate one’s appreciation of the blessings of the present. The philosophy of forgetfulness is a very profound philosophy.’

As he spoke he was conscious of an almost painful scraping of his chest, caused by the fluted gold setting of a certain little miniature he wore on a black ribbon round his neck. Artistically considered it was a very worthless little miniature, feebly tentatively painted and ill-drawn. It represented a young girl of seventeen or eighteen in a prim bodice of a bygone fashion. The young girl’s nose was uncertain, her forehead and the lower part of her face were in two different planes. She had little Mary Crookenden’s dark blue eyes and shaded fair hair. The Rector fancied the rim of the miniature must have caught against one of the buttons of his undershirt. He gave himself a shake to make it lie flat again.

1 If Mary is to be an Englishwoman, then in common justice to her, her father should have her brought up like other children/ Mrs. Crookenden proceeded, in her calm, impressive way. 1 Really, to-day, now, her appearance is most extraordinary. I am quite sorry for her, poor child. I am very glad we are alone. I should really regret her being seen except just by ourselves, you know. It is a thing one hardly likes to say of a relation, my dear Kent, but the poor child’s appearance is positively vulgar.’

Mrs. Crookenden drew herself up and moved her lips as though she had a bad taste in her mouth.

1 Dear me 1 ’ exclaimed the Rector. ‘ I had no idea Mary’s red frock was so seriously compromising. We

The Wages of Sin.

live and learn. Perhaps Mrs. Chloe’s taste is a trifle barbaric. But she is a good, faithful soul, nevertheless. And she has taught my cook some excellent Creole dishes, so of course my mouth is stopped. I can't speak evil of her/

1 1 am afraid her adulation of Mary is likely to put the poor child in a lamentably false position.'

1 Or start her with a wholesome stock of belief in the kindness of her fellow mortals/

Living alone had begotten a rather prosing habit in Mr. Crookenden, I fear.

1 These are the two points of view, Caroline,’ he went on. i Nature takes care of most young things. Gives them nests, or holes, or burrows ; affectionate, weak-minded parents to cuddle up against ; warms, feeds, shelters them — does her best to put them in a lamentably false position, in short. It is a necessary economy of force, I suppose. For if the poor little wretches did not start with a few delusions regarding their individual importance and the amiability of their species, they would hardly have courage to go on living at all. Just the same takes place in the case of the small human animal. Nature provides it with a silly, doting mother to stand between it and awkward realities, and bolster up its poor little pluck with comfortable lies ’